University of Twente Student Theses

Ocean waves of maximal amplitude

A ¿freak wave¿ is a wave that appears seemingly random and that is significantly larger
than the surrounding waves. It is a phenomenon that occurs on many oceans around the
world. These waves, that are known to have damaged and sunk some very large ships, will
appear very sudden and disappear just a short time after.
Tales of freak waves were once dismissed as seafaring myths. But nowadays the height
of the sea is continually monitored at many places such as oil rigs. One of these offshore
platforms, the Draupner platform in the Norwegian section of the North Sea, has recorded
a freak wave at 15:24 on 1st January 1995 [7]. (see figure 1)
We assume these freak waves originate from several smaller waves with different wavelengths
that travel with different velocities. These smaller waves may at some point combine
to one very big wave and almost immediately dissolve into smaller waves again.
In this report I¿ll try to find a description for the maximum wave height for all times,
hoping to understand some of the phenomena of the ocean a bit better.